Cultures Of Secrecy In Relation To The National Security State – Then and Now

An outcome of the US government’s success in the Second World War was a surge in national pride and trust in the central government. The trust gained by the government was used as a smokescreen to hide the increasingly imperialistic intentions of the American State(Dean). The national security state refers to the justification of excessive action due to concern for national security. Examples of such actions are Attempted coups in Third World countries, sabotage, and psychological warfare, abetting foreign regimes in repression, and using new techniques of torture (Dean), which were all part of the new “national security state.” The CIA and other such bureaucracies carried out these actions to secure the nation from external threats posed by rival powers. Initially, the existence of soviet espionage networks created justification to obscure the actions taken by the bureaucracy in the name of national security. This obscuring began a culture of secrecy that would continue to take root in the American hierarchy. The cultures of secrecy refer to keeping matters of national security secret from civilians in the name of national security. An example of institutionalizing the cultures of secrecy is in civilian institutions where the government pays large grants to perform research (Dean). As a result, these institutions would then publish findings that would go along with the narrative favored by the bureaucracy. The national security state refers to the justification of taking excessive action due to concern for national security by the military or bureaucracies such as the CIA.

The national security state can be seen at work in the aftermath of the nuclear testing done in rural Nevada and Utah. Starting with the very land where the testing was done belonging to the people of the Shoshone tribe according to the treaty of rubies signed between the tribe and the US government (Fox). In the name of national security, the government used that very land to perform nuclear testing without compensating the legal owners. Furthermore, the radioactive dust spread throughout the nearby areas to cause cataclysmic damage to the local economy, which relied on sheep (Fox). The nuclear fallout caused almost all the sheep in the area in 1953 to die off (Fox). The residents of Cedar City and nearby ranches were to lose their primary income because of the deaths. As a result, many were driven to bankruptcy and economic hardship. Many residents of the area were also facing multiple forms of cancer and blood disease (Fox). The national security state would be seen here, ensuring that the civilians were unable to get to the root cause of their plight. As they provided funding to the primary research institution, Utah State Agricultural College(USAC), the research done was always in favor of radioactivity not being the cause of death for the sheep (Fox). Whenever the affected civilians asked questions of government officials, they were repeatedly shot down by officials. A primary example of this mistreatment occurs in the case of Doug Clark, a widely respected community member who had been a city councilman and had completed a graduate degree; when he raised concerns to the government authorities regarding the deaths of cattle, he was belittled by the officials who called his intelligence into question. He would die of a heart attack that very day (Fox). The national security state made it impossible for the people of rural Utah and Nevada to gain compensation for their losses. It took steps to cover up the state’s part in the incidents.

In my view, the national security state still exists today; this is seen through the upcoming release of files on prominent assassinated figures 50 years after the events took place. The cultures of secrecy surrounding events still exist, and the national security state controls when information is released to the public. The releases so many years after the incident show the profound control of the national security state, and now, when interest in these files is minimal, they are being released.